Cold War and Nuclear Deterrence Theory
DETERRENCE
In its simplest form, deterrence consists of the following threat, intended to dissuade a state from aggression: ‘Do not attack me because if you do, something unacceptably horrible will happen to you.’ In other words, deterrence is a form of persuasion in military strategy. To convey such a threat, the deterrer must decide what constitutes an attack, and must then decide what level of response would be adequate to deter it. This in turn depends on the deterrer’s estimation of the adversary’s intentions and the values it places on them. For deterrence to succeed, the threat must also be credible. Not only must the potential aggressor believe that the costs of an attack would be higher than its benefits, but also that there is a significant likelihood that such costs would indeed be incurred.
As a strategy, deterrence is often contrasted with defence. The latter focuses on military capabilities rather than intentions. While deterrence works by the threat of punishment, defence works by denying the enemy’s ability to achieve its objectives once an attack has begun. It was only with the advent of nuclear weapons that such a distinction could be made in peacetime. Before the arrival of mutually assured destruction (MAD), the terms ‘deterrence’ and ‘defence’ simply referred to different time periods. Prior to an attack, military forces are supposed to deter an enemy. After the attack, when deterrence has failed, they are used to actively resist the attack.
In light of the unacceptable costs of nuclear war, military strategists and planners have devoted a great deal of attention to the requirements of deterrence in the nuclear age. Strange as it may seem, the main problem with the concept of nuclear deterrence is that (fortunately) no two nuclear-armed states have gone to war with each other using their nuclear weapons. The result is that none of the alleged requirements of nuclear deterrence is derived from a tested empirical theory. What theory has been developed is therefore deductive rather than inductive.
No one knows for sure what kind of attacks, or what kind of behavior in general, the possession of nuclear weapons deters. Nor is there any reliable answer to the question ‘How many nuclear weapons are enough?’ This is because the credibility of a deterrent threat depends on the perceptions of the adversary rather than the deterrer. Nevertheless, there are three issues that, although debated at some length in the context of the cold war, remain central to debates about nuclear deterrence in the post-cold war era.
First, there is much debate over the scope of nuclear deterrence, and the dilemmas associated with attempting to deter threats not only to one’s own state, but also to one’s allies. During the cold war, for example, the United States engaged in a strategy of extended deterrence.
Not only were its nuclear forces intended to deter a direct nuclear attack (or first strike) on its territory, but it was also believed that they could deter the Soviet Union from non-nuclear aggression against US allies in Western Europe, as well as a range of ‘provocative’ behavior by the Soviet Union and China. This is sometimes referred to as general deterrence as opposed to immediate deterrence directed against an imminent threat.
Second, there is no consensus in the literature on how best to make nuclear deterrence credible in the eyes of an adversary. There is a complex trade-off between credibility and effectiveness in thinking about nuclear deterrence. An available response to attack, which is very low in credibility, might be sufficient to deter if it poses a very severe sanction (e.g. massive retaliation) or if the aggressor’s prospective gain carries very little value for it. On the other hand, a threatened response that carries a rather high credibility but poses only moderate costs for the aggressor may not deter if the aggressor places a high value on its objective and anticipates a good chance of attaining it. During the cold war, advocates of ‘minimal deterrence’ debated with those who suggested that the United States should be prepared to fight a nuclear war with the Soviet Union in order to deter it. Nuclear deterrence strategy has long been plagued by the paradox that if deterrence should fail and war should begin, then it would not be rational actually to carry out a threat of nuclear retaliation upon which deterrence is based. Once attacked, a rationally calculating player has nothing to gain by massive retaliation.
Third, there has always been a heated debate over the levels and types of nuclear weapons necessary to achieve nuclear deterrence. On the one hand, many commentators believe that nuclear war is so unthinkable that nuclear-armed states co-exist in a situation of existential deterrence. As long as political leaders acknowledge the irrationality of nuclear weapons as instruments of war, and as long as it is impossible to defend oneself against a nuclear attack or to launch a nuclear attack in the realistic expectation of preventing any nuclear retaliation (otherwise known as second strike invulnerability), nuclear deterrence is not difficult to achieve. Other commentators argue the opposite case, claiming that the paradox of deterrence provides scope for an enemy to strike first. The choice between suicide or surrender should be avoided by blurring the so-called ‘firebreak’ between nuclear and conventional weapons, and having available a variety of options to deter a variety of attacks.
During the cold war these three issues were debated at some length, and there is a voluminous literature on the subject. Thankfully, the cold war ended without a nuclear war. None the less, as long as nuclear weapons exist, the same issues will remain pertinent in the future. If we have learnt anything from the experience of nuclear deterrence over the last 50 years, it is that deterrence is not merely a stockpile of weapons. A nuclear strategy allegedly based on this concept neither ensures the continuation of peace nor allows political leaders to ignore the international context that makes deterrence necessary.
1. Nuclear Deterrence in Theory and in Practice During the Cold War.
Deterrence is a coercive strategy, describing all the processes of dissuading an opponent to do what could be advantageous to them but harmful to you, using the threat of force in response to non-compliance. Lawrence Freedman compares deterrence against strategies of persuading others to do what might be harmful to them but which is advantageous to you which is comepllence . For easy description I use the simplified entities of A , B and C to represent opponents in those relationship described as deterrence. A is the initial deterrer and is deterring B. This situation is not always as straightforward as A deterring B. C is a third party. The deterrence can be seen in the following relationship. A detects and fears B moving to or intending to take action that could benefit itself but which are also in the way of A’s interests. A would then attempt to successfully communicate to B that should they take that action they were planning or take advantage of that opportunity, there would be retributive retaliation. A would define the form of this retaliation in the use of military force and try to convince B that the threat is real, in that physical capability is there, and that A is also serious about using it in response to B’s failure to take heed of A’s signals. Therefore if B understands and decides not to go ahead with the action or gears away from doing or developing a particular set of plans fearing A’s response, then B has been deterred by A. Deterrence is then about ‘inducing inaction,’ as Tom Schelling is quoted by Freedman. In this way, because A has prevented B from doing something, A has preserved the status quo This means then that the success of deterrence is seen in nothing happening, Freedman, (2004).
Credibility of the threat is a core decisive factor in successful deterrence. It has to be robust enough to convince B that it is in its own interest to revert from former plans or intentions. Other factors are important in successful deterrence and deterrence is manifested in different ways and to different degrees as would be explored further below. Deterrence is underlined by the idea that the entities of A and B are rational actors therefore asses the likely action of other actors through a rational choice theory. From the point of view of A as it deters B, B has the same rational standards as A. In this way A can view B as the mirror image of itself. This means that it constructs threats in relation to B with the idea that B would do what A would do in the same situation. And therefore, if A takes Y measure to prevent B from doing X, then A would do this by reflecting what it would do and expect B to react likewise.
Inevitably, in practice this idea is contentious not only because what is rational in practice may fluctuate with changing contexts and which at times can lead state leaders acting in ways which are contrary to what they themselves are professing as rational. But also because it is difficult for A to discern what B’s interests might be since it would require having an accurate assessment of B’s motives and perceptions. It simply is true that some leaders are risk adverse and cautious while others are more aggressive, willing to risk more, not humble enough to negotiate and not phased by the idea of being the cause of deaths of a horrendous number of people.
Successful deterrence also depends on what A is demanding and the extent to which B is capable of or willing to resist A’s call. A can be more effective in dissuading B by balancing credible threats with the way it communicates it’s message to B, perhaps conveying a sense of urgency as well as providing positive incentives for acceding, and also incorporating reassurances. Credibility can be backed up with demonstrations of political resolve by using force in other conflicts while also showing the availability of resources and therefore fortifying the threat. When the USA gradually entered the Vietnam War in the middle of the Cold War, it was to contain the spread of communism. The war perceived as a task that can be completed quickly and decisively was also likely to have been viewed as an opportunity for the USA to flex its muscles. The USA could demonstrate to hostile states that they would not be allowed to get away with pursuing goals against the USA without consequence. A has to also make it clear to B that the retaliation could leave it in a worst situation than before. This is because A could either prevent B from acquiring or determining what it wants to for itself, but even after that, what will descend on B as punishment from A would significantly out way what it gained from its endeavour. When considering the example of Israel and its repeated Arab wars, Jonathan Shimshoni identifies this as the “costly signal,” to explain that, this engaging in conflicts can support deterrence because it shows determination of resolve. This can also come under what Freedman has called ‘enforcement costs.’ This point would get across if a timely response was given to those actors that wont give in and that this response should be decisive.
In this, B’s intended action or considered intended action, move from the state of being infecting abstract considerations to actually being a decided interest for B to respond to A’s demands positively. In considering deterrence through denial, Freedman points to ‘two type of costs’ that B can incur if it tries to resist A. These are the resistant costs and compliance costs. Glen Snyder describes denial as A creating an environment that denies B the strategic option. The use of force is one way that A can do this. The resistant costs for B will be those that it will bare in order to prevent A from carrying out its threat, in creating that situation which is advantageous to himself. In the Cold War, the USA and NATO worked continuously to maintain that situation by acquiring a larger nuclear arsenal and more accurate nuclear weapons than the USSR, while the USSR did the same vis a vis NATO and the USA. If B fails in its resistance, it has to then deal with the compliance cost.
Deterrence through denial is contrasted with deterrence through punishment which is the use of direct force by A to convince B that an attack against A would be extremely undesirable. Nuclear deterrence in practice could include investment and the building of an anti ballistic missile capability with the view of responding to B’s attacks with a force that would effectively disable B. This would discourage B from any such attacks. Maintaining this capability is extremely costly. In punishment, the cost of compliance for B would have to be relatively high to A’s compellence costs to justify it. Where the cost are balanced and so that the situation is not decisively advantageous to A so as to deny B choice, B may see opportunity to take advantage of this situation. In this case, A may prefer to gear policy towards denial which is supported by wider measures other than military or in the latter case, a single decisive weapon. Additionally denial over punishment will be less costly. It was because of this reason that NATO unable to meet the War Saw Pact’s conventional weapons arsenal, decided to remedy it through denial using nuclear weapons. Arguably, nuclear deterrence through denial characterised the Cold- War.
Where A is able to convince B of the credibility of its threat, the deterrence directed at B could create an internalised deterrence in C or D hostile states. In their calculations of opportunities for securing interests, C and D already make room to consider what the likely reactions of A might be, unwittingly or otherwise. A has made it clear to C and D that to work against A’s interests would be ‘unwise as it would be unwelcome. In this way deterrence moves away from just being directed at B and to a multiple audience.
It’s easier for A to convince B of its strengths, when it is stronger than B. The nuclear bomb had an equalizing effect in the Cold War that made the relationship of A deterring B deficient to describe the Soviet Union and USA/NATO relationship during the Cold War. In the course of the Cold War, the USSR and USA acquired large enough nuclear arsenals and relevant weapons to impose thorough destruction on the other. They both developed second strike capabilities. This meant that should either the USSR or the USA first strike the other, the other would respond with equal force and ensure that both loose. This therefore assured mutual destruction, the abbreviations of which is not absurdly MAD. At the birth of nuclear weapons, their utility was also able to be considered in tactical use. With large arsenals on both side, even where tactical nuclear weapons could be used, it was judged that there were no adequate measures preventing escalation to total war of super power nuclear exchanges and ultimately to those most terrible and destructive of the bombs. Because of this, there was a consensus that total war should be avoided, and that nuclear weapons had their utility in deterrence. Because they assured indiscriminately decisive annihilation all sane parties saw it in their benefit to ensure that no total war arose. However, limited wars were still prevalent in the Cold War. In limited wars, the powers could engage in proxy wars supporting states with sympathetic ideologies as well as strategic merit to ensure the spread of their particular peace as well as consolidating control over coveted geographical areas. They used conventional weapons and worked to keep it limited. This was seen in the Soviet-Afghan War from 1979 where Soviet Union forces supported the Marxist Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan while the Mujahideen resistance they fought against found support in the USA as well as in others.[8] Even as they fought, there was a dreading sense that these wars could escalate into direct confrontations between the USSR and the USA and which could transform into nuclear war.
Deterrence moved away from narrow deterrence, that is incorporating planning at the theatre and tactical levels and instead more towards broad deterrence. A broader deterrence for the major nuclear powers meant avoiding total war, lest it escalate into total war of nuclear exchange which Herman Kahn wrote as ‘Type I’.[9] Thinking about deterrence also moved away from central deterrence, which is deterrence of the coherent geographical homeland to extended deterrence that includes the allies. The USA adopted this with the view that in a situation of MAD, a direct attack from the USSR was unlikely but tensions that could erupt into violent conflict against it’s extending overseas interests and allies were not negligible. Because of this, even while engaging in limited wars in the non-western world, efforts were made between the USSR and the USA to keep their allies from engaging in foolish wars that could end up employing nuclear weapons and involving them. This could’ve happen when an ally was directly challenged and nuclear deterrence had to become immediate because of the crisis. The whole world could be placed in danger because of one false miscalculation in the sudden shifting in posturing, or the hasty action of one determined and unrelenting leader. So in a sense, once the bombs were there and it seemed a complicated situation to disarm either side, what seemed to make the most sense was to ensure nuclear weapons would lead to MAD. In this there was assurance that the thought of launching a first strike would be considered so diabolical and irrational that it would simply not be used. Therefore the utility of nuclear weapons could be seen in general deterrence rather than in immediate deterrence. That is nuclear weapons could be used for A to send a vague threat to B and B would be dissuaded.[10]
With MAD, deterrence could become compellence and the deterrer could become the deterred. When A devises deterrence policy, it has to also consider the real option that B has of resisting it as well as of imposing its own controls on the choices of A. In the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, the USA warned the USSR not to pass ships carrying more missiles in the American blockade and also to stop building missile bases in Cuba. The Soviet Union in turn, was still able to tell the Americans that should their threat be realised, there would be sure consequences. In this way the deterrence process has to be adaptable since A no longer has the advantage of creating a situation where B’s choices are denied, and that possibly any coercion can be met with counter coercion. It may mean as it did in the cold war a different way of bargaining and can even offer room for co-operation on another strands of the relationship, as was the case between the USSR and USA, when it came to nuclear arms control, even while deterring each other. This could be seen when the USA and USSR signed in 1972 the SALT I covering a number of areas including the limitation of ballistic missiles. [11] Bilateral actions such as this has, contributed to the vertical decrease in the absolute numbers of nuclear weapons to this day.
2. Nuclear Proliferation and Nuclear Deterrence
Is the Horizontal Spread of Nuclear Weapons Accompanied by Notions of Deterrence?
From the period since 1945 to 1991 or the end of the Cold War international politics can be described as having moved into a Second nuclear age. This is on the account of nuclear deterrence theory having to be re-conceptualised in a world marked by a different balance of power as well as new issues of security facing the nation state as well as international security. At the start of the 21st century the possibility of further horizontal nuclear proliferation has not been eliminated and the extent to which the doctrine and resulting policies of deterrence is accompanying this spread is likely to affect the view on deterrence. Most of the literature especially as exemplified by the rise in the discourse of rogue and weak states, suggests that deterrence remains contentious in discussions of contemporary international politics. One of the main reasons is the inability to give utility to nuclear weapons in the current multi-polar world. This is demonstrated in the uncertainty that the spread of nuclear weapons has been accompanied with the same ideas of their utility that maintained deterrence in the Cold War. Most of the states so far who want to acquire nuclear weapons have shown themselves to lack those particular qualities that led the USSR and the USA to arrive at a national deterrence strategy once realising the nature of the utility of nuclear weapons. When the NPT was opened for signatures in 1968, it only recognised China, Great Britain, France, USSR/Russia and the United States as the five legitimate nuclear powers. All other non nuclear states that signed did so with the agreement of refraining from acquiring nuclear weapons. [12]All of the World’s states are signatories with the exception of India , Israel, Pakistan and North Korea after pulling out in 2003.[13]
Deterrence Problematic in Multi-polar World.
Deterrence after the Cold War has continued to be problematic for at least these reasons. First the long peace written about the Cold War after it had ended was constituted by the assured danger of destruction, which created stability that relied on a situation of too great a balance of accumulated weapons that create danger and the likelihood of war. [14] The particular national cultures of the USSR and the USA allowed them to respond to MAD by adopting deterrence and deciding internally that they would never use nuclear weapons while bluffing to their opponent that they will certainly use them some if they had to. Secondly the bi-polarity created by the two, meant the focus was clear and policy can be directed relatively easily. In the Post Cold War world, the model of deterrence based on mirror imaging and deterrence through denial by rational actors is not so readily applicable. This is because the fall of the Soviet Union created a relatively more multi-polar balance which was compounded by the economic growth of more countries who are able to assert themselves if not necessarily to balance themselves against the United States but certainly to challenge its consolidated hegemony. Even as there have been a vertical decrease in the numbers of nuclear weapons by the super powers, there has been a horizontal spread of nuclear weapons. There is still concern in the international system that more states could acquire nuclear weapons.
North Korea and Iran Exemplify Case Studies of Continuing Concern over Horizontal Nuclear Proliferation.
The extent to which Chairman Kim Jong Il and president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are viewed as being likely to adopt deterrence will affect the utility with which it is viewed. Currently and since the Korean War for North Korea and the 1970s Iranian War for Iran represent to the international system, the ‘foremost nuclear proliferation issues.’ [15] North Korea and its leader has built a reputation of dissent that remains a worrying concern. It formally withdrew from the NPT, and has proved unreliable in its commitments to ongoing talks to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons. It has proved unresponsive to talks with the US, Russia, South Korea, Japan and most notably, even with China which has failed to appease it. Instead in October 2006[16] it carried out its first atomic test in defiance of the rest of the international community. In 2006 the a UN resolution banned North Korea from continuing further activity to do with its missile programme. In 2007 when the UN failed to apologise for the condemnation of its programme, it banned international inspectors and also pulled out of the six party talks involving the countries above. Most recently in 2009, North carried an underground test of nuclear bomb it claimed was as big as those dropped by the US on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and which were also felt in earth quake tremors in South Korea, as well as the China coast. Pyongyang has shown an independent streak with defiance for international regimes of co-operation. Iran is a topical concern because it has a workable bomb design but had not been produced yet. The concern is in the uncertainty of whether or not it wants to develop nuclear weapons. President Ahmadinejad has responded to claims of his intentions to have plutonium converted for nuclear bombs, by repeatedly retorting this and claiming, its for nuclear energy. CIA intelligence claim, that even if it does want to build a nuclear bomb, it is some fifteen years away to that capability.[17]
The USA developed the nuclear bomb as the ultimate weapon able to debilitate an enemy army to the point of total annihilation. For all the latter countries that became nuclear including the USSR itself, did so from the allure of the bomb as an equalising capability. Indeed the USA developed their bomb with the view of meeting the Soviet threat in conventional arms. For Both North Korea and Iran, the concern is that their behaviour in regards to the security regimes of the international system, have not revealed them to be the assuring candidates for maintaining a national strategy of deterrence. In some ways this is hypocritical if we were to talk about an international system characterised by multi-polarity and which can be described an international system of states. When the USA and the USSR developed their arsenals, deterrence came after, in the coming to terms with the implications of the nuclear weapon. They both intended to use them in war situations. And there were no overbearing forces challenging their rights to do so, as the modern USA and Russia as well as the rest of the international community represent against particular states with their eye on the ultimate weapon. They too want to assert their right ands choice as well as maintain national security. Representatives for the North Korean Foreign Ministry emphasise the usefulness of the latest bomb testing as a form of bargaining leverage. It could be understood from their literature that a main goal of Pyongyang is to establish direct dialogue with the USA. And certainly creating a situation of tension for the US could compel its administration to engage with North Korea. For Iran, an investment and the securing of nuclear weapons today can ensure to some extent a more inclined USA/ Western ear. There are prevailing ideas in Iran concerning its state craft as a modern Islamic republic, able to decide its own future without being restricted by the USA and the West. And without western culture marauding national culture. It could encompass a toleration for neighbours outside their borders with unlikely intentions of nuclear attacks for the sake of self-assertion , a lack of unnecessary dangerouse posturing or relentless wars of expansion.
In the second nuclear age we are able to talk about security being more than the geopolitical security of the state but also as security of the human. This view comes under broader definitions of security, or under the liberal peace thesis of the ‘responsibility to protect,’ which shot roots in the aftermath of the Cold war and which are discussed further in chapter four. Under these frameworks the security of the integrity of the state can be justified in its capacity to protect its citizens. If the international community has a responsibility to protect, then the question of national security is international. In this way security concerns of any one country is able to be assessed the international community, in terms of its effect in the wider family of human beings. Under this framework we can justify the concern that so far North Korea and Iran refuse to engage in calls from international regimes of peace. However, it can be said once more that these regimes prevailing regimes of peace could simply be a reflection of the prominent power and their peace. Nonetheless, their dissident behaviour as also marked by their domestic politics has led some commentators to describe them as presenting an aggressive and hot headed tendency, which is not compatible with the ideas of the rational actor, which underpins the working of nuclear deterrence.[18] And also which worked to prevent total war even in the absurdity of MAD. Furthermore, the second nuclear age exists in an international system where developing communication and transportation technology is able to transform the methods used by violent dissident groups, as exemplified though not unique to the 9/11 attacks in New York as wells the 7/7 London bombings, in most recent times. In being uncertain about the character of the statesmen as wells national strategy leading Iran and North Korea, this very much presents opportunity for thinking about worse case scenarios of nuclear weapons getting into the wrong hands which challenges the existence of deterrence in the 21st century and the utility of nuclear weapons.
4. Issues in Contemporary International Security and Deterrence in the Second Nuclear Age.
In the first decade of the 21st century state foreign policies continue to be challenged in arriving at policy efforts which recognises the contemporary nature of an interdependent global economy underlined by distinctly new developments in communication and information technologies even alongside effects of traditional transformations of labour movement from areas of high cost production to those of low cost production. States find themselves having to rethink their state sovereignty for securing economic prosperity seen in developments states gathering in regional or international economic organisations. Since its creation the European Union (EU) has seen two further enlargements, as well as increased powers as an organisation and further integration as body of individual states, as for example the opportunity for countries to join a common European Union (EU) currency which 12 countries have joined. In 2007, a Referendum was held in European Union countries to ratify an updated EU constitution. Over 80% of the members exchanged their sovereignty for more open trading markets and economic environments. The example of the EU is supplement to the continued existence and working of international economic organisations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World bank. A large number of developing countries continue to have their prerogatives for domestic policy challenged by these organisations in the form of conditional loans since the 1980s. In the second nuclear age they have not left. The relevance of sovereignty in discussing challenges to deterrence is seeing nuclear deterrence as a strategy conducted in an international society of states with equal judicial and de facto sovereignty. With similar capabilities, they can deter each other. The contemporary international relations, causes states to find alternative ways of securing a varieties of national interests, which cannot be reduced to ideological containment or defence and expansion.
In an international politics free to focus on more issues other than the super power nuclear stand- off, Climate change has been recognised as a major threat to international security. Today it grows in importance in policy analysis. The notion that burning fossil fuels are leading to increased global temperatures which could melt ice caps and lead to floods in some areas of the world and droughts in others, was initially driven by a normative purpose to secure the survival of human life in the preservation of the earth. The challenge against it , as it was in the beginning was its difficulty in being justified as a major priority since policies to prevent further climate change were and are still juxtaposed against policies for economic growth. In recent years however the impact of climate change on international security is being increasingly seen as significant even as there remains difficulty in reconciling it with economic policy. The aim of the Stern Review in 2006 was to calculate an economic cost of taking no action against climate change in the immediate term. The Kyoto Protocol plays a role in recognising climate change and so do world wide efforts accompanying it. However these efforts of states coming together to tackle a common evil, which renders nuclear deterrence counterproductive, is not universal. International politics still has decisive streaks of real-politick which are not overcome by these international threats. For example the US, before being over taken by China as the worlds biggest polluter in 2007, refused to join and apply the Kyoto Protocol. However more recent investigations show increased domestic efforts guided by international regimes are growing and expanding in domestic sectors to fight against climate change.
At least in the last five years, the theme of energy security with the notion that this has to be sustainable has become more pronounced. Arguably the debate on climate change has been sustained also because of the realisation that the resources countries use today ( coal, oil, gas ), to run the technologies that sustain the modern society will not be provided by the earth indefinitely. In this initial stage there has been international pressure for training the continued development of the world economy to grow in a sustainable manner. This has been accompanied and will likely gain momentum as the years go by, for pressures to find alternative sustainable energy sources. The British Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) since 2007 has been developing an Alternative energy and Sustainability programme[33] to research how the British Ministry of Defence (MoD) can decrease vulnerability to capability by becoming less reliant on scarce energy resources. It aims in the short run to reduce the level of energy the whole army and its support requires, in the medium run securing alternative fuels, and in the long run to secure alternative energy sources and therefore also changing technologies, equipment and practices appropriately. Alternatives are combined heat and power plants, solar and hydrogen cells, heat pumps and wind power , synthetic, hybrid or bio fuels, are being considered in 2009. The hope for alternative energy seems to lie in a technological fix of capturing Carbon Dioxide from the air or renewable energy. There may be a perceived need for international efforts to move this process along to facilitate more efficient use of scarce energy or methods of power generation and technology that captures CO2. This is likely to be seen along with domestic analysis such as that of the MoD, spread in most sector of society across many states in the near future. Energy security remains a profound challenge to the existence of states if states exist as a means to protect human beings. It threatens modern lives as we know it today. This then displaces nuclear deterrence as a central priority in national security at the start of the 21st century. However, these efforts are just as likely to encourage much more uncooperative foreign policies of national security where each state senses a growing insecurity and a growing untrustworthiness for other states. Instead each wants to secure scare energy for itself. There maybe more efforts aimed at being less vulnerable to lack of energy, relative to other states and move to more unilateral efforts for national interests.
Nonetheless a sense of an international community is likely to be reconstituted as there remains a notion of having to co-ordinate internationally to find energy that is sustainable not only in being available indefinitely but also in a way that isn’t risky to the earth and therefore to human life. The consequences of detrimental usage of natural resources are understood as being capable of affecting every country. So security even if narrowed down to state security is challenged by a threat that requires co-operative methods which is contrary to the oppositional politics that allowed deterrence to thrive. This first decade on the new millennium also sees a continuation of efforts against terrorism after 9/11. This international co-operation has called for states to find ground for mutual benefits even in ideologically differing states such as Pakistan and USA, to interact for a certain outcome.
There remains a myriad of policy areas demanding of states an international relations whether in more mutually beneficial co-operation or ones much more underlined by relative power relations, to tackle international threats such as global warming and energy security or countering terrorism. They require an international relations and politics that is much more sensitive and multifaceted. This is whether in the kind of relationship formed by states with other states but also in the way they have to incorporate policies to support non state actors such as multinational companies for some countries a, or defending domestic policies against non-state actors such as multinational companies for some. It is an international politics that doesn’t easily incorporate the notion of an indefinite end of states acquiring nuclear weapons and then deciding to use it in deterrence against regional or distant enemies.
Conclusion
Nuclear deterrence was out of favour at least since the end of the Cold War mainly because in order to work it was supported by both the USSR and the Soviet Union acquiring nuclear arms more than the other. It was a reversal of logic that the maintenance of uncertainty created by one country against the other should secure inaction and peace. The two superpowers held the whole world at risk. Nuclear deterrence was also criticised because it worked on the assumption that all actors involved are rational actors, so that their behaviour could be rationalised and appropriate policy arrived at. The calculations for this exclude and ignore the other options available for the state being deterred or the state being compelled in return. Those are for example the chance that the deterred or target of deterrence could have alternative perceptions and so may misread signals, also that each might have a different view of what constitutes rational behaviour. This could be seen in the way different national strategic culture can affect nuclear policy.
Nuclear proliferation remains dangerous not least because of the continued threat of international terrorism but also of unstable states. Military preventative action has been the main response to national nuclear deterrence where for example preventative action against Iran and North Korea might be considered. There are calls for a much more democratic transformation of deterrence into a broader umbrella and one which emphasises the common interest of survival along with other contemporary threats to the international system seen in this light such as global warming.
The fact remains however states have to live in world where other some nuclear weapons exist and some states do have them. In the second nuclear age, this fact competes against other emerging contemporary issues impacting the foreign polices of states, such as climate change, energy security human security and economic security in way in didn’t have to during the cold war. The total number of nuclear arms has been decreasing since the height of the Cold War, on the account of Both Russia and the USA decreasing their absolute vertical numbers. However horizontally the have spread, often with the countries who acquired them expressing the same views of wanting to secure national borders from stronger enemies. Nonetheless most states in the world it would seem do not mind falling under the nuclear umbrella of the initial nuclear powers. What is strikingly different in the Second nuclear age is the rising number of threats confronting states attention, policy time and effort as well as funds which are likely to win over nuclear weapons for non nuclear sates. For nuclear states it seems a safer bet to remain maintaining ones own while the enemy is still capable of using theirs even if this is to a much less degree than in the cold war. Certainly central place of nuclear deterrence is being continually challenged.
In its simplest form, deterrence consists of the following threat, intended to dissuade a state from aggression: ‘Do not attack me because if you do, something unacceptably horrible will happen to you.’ In other words, deterrence is a form of persuasion in military strategy. To convey such a threat, the deterrer must decide what constitutes an attack, and must then decide what level of response would be adequate to deter it. This in turn depends on the deterrer’s estimation of the adversary’s intentions and the values it places on them. For deterrence to succeed, the threat must also be credible. Not only must the potential aggressor believe that the costs of an attack would be higher than its benefits, but also that there is a significant likelihood that such costs would indeed be incurred.
As a strategy, deterrence is often contrasted with defence. The latter focuses on military capabilities rather than intentions. While deterrence works by the threat of punishment, defence works by denying the enemy’s ability to achieve its objectives once an attack has begun. It was only with the advent of nuclear weapons that such a distinction could be made in peacetime. Before the arrival of mutually assured destruction (MAD), the terms ‘deterrence’ and ‘defence’ simply referred to different time periods. Prior to an attack, military forces are supposed to deter an enemy. After the attack, when deterrence has failed, they are used to actively resist the attack.
In light of the unacceptable costs of nuclear war, military strategists and planners have devoted a great deal of attention to the requirements of deterrence in the nuclear age. Strange as it may seem, the main problem with the concept of nuclear deterrence is that (fortunately) no two nuclear-armed states have gone to war with each other using their nuclear weapons. The result is that none of the alleged requirements of nuclear deterrence is derived from a tested empirical theory. What theory has been developed is therefore deductive rather than inductive.
No one knows for sure what kind of attacks, or what kind of behavior in general, the possession of nuclear weapons deters. Nor is there any reliable answer to the question ‘How many nuclear weapons are enough?’ This is because the credibility of a deterrent threat depends on the perceptions of the adversary rather than the deterrer. Nevertheless, there are three issues that, although debated at some length in the context of the cold war, remain central to debates about nuclear deterrence in the post-cold war era.
First, there is much debate over the scope of nuclear deterrence, and the dilemmas associated with attempting to deter threats not only to one’s own state, but also to one’s allies. During the cold war, for example, the United States engaged in a strategy of extended deterrence.
Not only were its nuclear forces intended to deter a direct nuclear attack (or first strike) on its territory, but it was also believed that they could deter the Soviet Union from non-nuclear aggression against US allies in Western Europe, as well as a range of ‘provocative’ behavior by the Soviet Union and China. This is sometimes referred to as general deterrence as opposed to immediate deterrence directed against an imminent threat.
Second, there is no consensus in the literature on how best to make nuclear deterrence credible in the eyes of an adversary. There is a complex trade-off between credibility and effectiveness in thinking about nuclear deterrence. An available response to attack, which is very low in credibility, might be sufficient to deter if it poses a very severe sanction (e.g. massive retaliation) or if the aggressor’s prospective gain carries very little value for it. On the other hand, a threatened response that carries a rather high credibility but poses only moderate costs for the aggressor may not deter if the aggressor places a high value on its objective and anticipates a good chance of attaining it. During the cold war, advocates of ‘minimal deterrence’ debated with those who suggested that the United States should be prepared to fight a nuclear war with the Soviet Union in order to deter it. Nuclear deterrence strategy has long been plagued by the paradox that if deterrence should fail and war should begin, then it would not be rational actually to carry out a threat of nuclear retaliation upon which deterrence is based. Once attacked, a rationally calculating player has nothing to gain by massive retaliation.
Third, there has always been a heated debate over the levels and types of nuclear weapons necessary to achieve nuclear deterrence. On the one hand, many commentators believe that nuclear war is so unthinkable that nuclear-armed states co-exist in a situation of existential deterrence. As long as political leaders acknowledge the irrationality of nuclear weapons as instruments of war, and as long as it is impossible to defend oneself against a nuclear attack or to launch a nuclear attack in the realistic expectation of preventing any nuclear retaliation (otherwise known as second strike invulnerability), nuclear deterrence is not difficult to achieve. Other commentators argue the opposite case, claiming that the paradox of deterrence provides scope for an enemy to strike first. The choice between suicide or surrender should be avoided by blurring the so-called ‘firebreak’ between nuclear and conventional weapons, and having available a variety of options to deter a variety of attacks.
During the cold war these three issues were debated at some length, and there is a voluminous literature on the subject. Thankfully, the cold war ended without a nuclear war. None the less, as long as nuclear weapons exist, the same issues will remain pertinent in the future. If we have learnt anything from the experience of nuclear deterrence over the last 50 years, it is that deterrence is not merely a stockpile of weapons. A nuclear strategy allegedly based on this concept neither ensures the continuation of peace nor allows political leaders to ignore the international context that makes deterrence necessary.
1. Nuclear Deterrence in Theory and in Practice During the Cold War.
Deterrence is a coercive strategy, describing all the processes of dissuading an opponent to do what could be advantageous to them but harmful to you, using the threat of force in response to non-compliance. Lawrence Freedman compares deterrence against strategies of persuading others to do what might be harmful to them but which is advantageous to you which is comepllence . For easy description I use the simplified entities of A , B and C to represent opponents in those relationship described as deterrence. A is the initial deterrer and is deterring B. This situation is not always as straightforward as A deterring B. C is a third party. The deterrence can be seen in the following relationship. A detects and fears B moving to or intending to take action that could benefit itself but which are also in the way of A’s interests. A would then attempt to successfully communicate to B that should they take that action they were planning or take advantage of that opportunity, there would be retributive retaliation. A would define the form of this retaliation in the use of military force and try to convince B that the threat is real, in that physical capability is there, and that A is also serious about using it in response to B’s failure to take heed of A’s signals. Therefore if B understands and decides not to go ahead with the action or gears away from doing or developing a particular set of plans fearing A’s response, then B has been deterred by A. Deterrence is then about ‘inducing inaction,’ as Tom Schelling is quoted by Freedman. In this way, because A has prevented B from doing something, A has preserved the status quo This means then that the success of deterrence is seen in nothing happening, Freedman, (2004).
Credibility of the threat is a core decisive factor in successful deterrence. It has to be robust enough to convince B that it is in its own interest to revert from former plans or intentions. Other factors are important in successful deterrence and deterrence is manifested in different ways and to different degrees as would be explored further below. Deterrence is underlined by the idea that the entities of A and B are rational actors therefore asses the likely action of other actors through a rational choice theory. From the point of view of A as it deters B, B has the same rational standards as A. In this way A can view B as the mirror image of itself. This means that it constructs threats in relation to B with the idea that B would do what A would do in the same situation. And therefore, if A takes Y measure to prevent B from doing X, then A would do this by reflecting what it would do and expect B to react likewise.
Inevitably, in practice this idea is contentious not only because what is rational in practice may fluctuate with changing contexts and which at times can lead state leaders acting in ways which are contrary to what they themselves are professing as rational. But also because it is difficult for A to discern what B’s interests might be since it would require having an accurate assessment of B’s motives and perceptions. It simply is true that some leaders are risk adverse and cautious while others are more aggressive, willing to risk more, not humble enough to negotiate and not phased by the idea of being the cause of deaths of a horrendous number of people.
Successful deterrence also depends on what A is demanding and the extent to which B is capable of or willing to resist A’s call. A can be more effective in dissuading B by balancing credible threats with the way it communicates it’s message to B, perhaps conveying a sense of urgency as well as providing positive incentives for acceding, and also incorporating reassurances. Credibility can be backed up with demonstrations of political resolve by using force in other conflicts while also showing the availability of resources and therefore fortifying the threat. When the USA gradually entered the Vietnam War in the middle of the Cold War, it was to contain the spread of communism. The war perceived as a task that can be completed quickly and decisively was also likely to have been viewed as an opportunity for the USA to flex its muscles. The USA could demonstrate to hostile states that they would not be allowed to get away with pursuing goals against the USA without consequence. A has to also make it clear to B that the retaliation could leave it in a worst situation than before. This is because A could either prevent B from acquiring or determining what it wants to for itself, but even after that, what will descend on B as punishment from A would significantly out way what it gained from its endeavour. When considering the example of Israel and its repeated Arab wars, Jonathan Shimshoni identifies this as the “costly signal,” to explain that, this engaging in conflicts can support deterrence because it shows determination of resolve. This can also come under what Freedman has called ‘enforcement costs.’ This point would get across if a timely response was given to those actors that wont give in and that this response should be decisive.
In this, B’s intended action or considered intended action, move from the state of being infecting abstract considerations to actually being a decided interest for B to respond to A’s demands positively. In considering deterrence through denial, Freedman points to ‘two type of costs’ that B can incur if it tries to resist A. These are the resistant costs and compliance costs. Glen Snyder describes denial as A creating an environment that denies B the strategic option. The use of force is one way that A can do this. The resistant costs for B will be those that it will bare in order to prevent A from carrying out its threat, in creating that situation which is advantageous to himself. In the Cold War, the USA and NATO worked continuously to maintain that situation by acquiring a larger nuclear arsenal and more accurate nuclear weapons than the USSR, while the USSR did the same vis a vis NATO and the USA. If B fails in its resistance, it has to then deal with the compliance cost.
Deterrence through denial is contrasted with deterrence through punishment which is the use of direct force by A to convince B that an attack against A would be extremely undesirable. Nuclear deterrence in practice could include investment and the building of an anti ballistic missile capability with the view of responding to B’s attacks with a force that would effectively disable B. This would discourage B from any such attacks. Maintaining this capability is extremely costly. In punishment, the cost of compliance for B would have to be relatively high to A’s compellence costs to justify it. Where the cost are balanced and so that the situation is not decisively advantageous to A so as to deny B choice, B may see opportunity to take advantage of this situation. In this case, A may prefer to gear policy towards denial which is supported by wider measures other than military or in the latter case, a single decisive weapon. Additionally denial over punishment will be less costly. It was because of this reason that NATO unable to meet the War Saw Pact’s conventional weapons arsenal, decided to remedy it through denial using nuclear weapons. Arguably, nuclear deterrence through denial characterised the Cold- War.
Where A is able to convince B of the credibility of its threat, the deterrence directed at B could create an internalised deterrence in C or D hostile states. In their calculations of opportunities for securing interests, C and D already make room to consider what the likely reactions of A might be, unwittingly or otherwise. A has made it clear to C and D that to work against A’s interests would be ‘unwise as it would be unwelcome. In this way deterrence moves away from just being directed at B and to a multiple audience.
It’s easier for A to convince B of its strengths, when it is stronger than B. The nuclear bomb had an equalizing effect in the Cold War that made the relationship of A deterring B deficient to describe the Soviet Union and USA/NATO relationship during the Cold War. In the course of the Cold War, the USSR and USA acquired large enough nuclear arsenals and relevant weapons to impose thorough destruction on the other. They both developed second strike capabilities. This meant that should either the USSR or the USA first strike the other, the other would respond with equal force and ensure that both loose. This therefore assured mutual destruction, the abbreviations of which is not absurdly MAD. At the birth of nuclear weapons, their utility was also able to be considered in tactical use. With large arsenals on both side, even where tactical nuclear weapons could be used, it was judged that there were no adequate measures preventing escalation to total war of super power nuclear exchanges and ultimately to those most terrible and destructive of the bombs. Because of this, there was a consensus that total war should be avoided, and that nuclear weapons had their utility in deterrence. Because they assured indiscriminately decisive annihilation all sane parties saw it in their benefit to ensure that no total war arose. However, limited wars were still prevalent in the Cold War. In limited wars, the powers could engage in proxy wars supporting states with sympathetic ideologies as well as strategic merit to ensure the spread of their particular peace as well as consolidating control over coveted geographical areas. They used conventional weapons and worked to keep it limited. This was seen in the Soviet-Afghan War from 1979 where Soviet Union forces supported the Marxist Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan while the Mujahideen resistance they fought against found support in the USA as well as in others.[8] Even as they fought, there was a dreading sense that these wars could escalate into direct confrontations between the USSR and the USA and which could transform into nuclear war.
Deterrence moved away from narrow deterrence, that is incorporating planning at the theatre and tactical levels and instead more towards broad deterrence. A broader deterrence for the major nuclear powers meant avoiding total war, lest it escalate into total war of nuclear exchange which Herman Kahn wrote as ‘Type I’.[9] Thinking about deterrence also moved away from central deterrence, which is deterrence of the coherent geographical homeland to extended deterrence that includes the allies. The USA adopted this with the view that in a situation of MAD, a direct attack from the USSR was unlikely but tensions that could erupt into violent conflict against it’s extending overseas interests and allies were not negligible. Because of this, even while engaging in limited wars in the non-western world, efforts were made between the USSR and the USA to keep their allies from engaging in foolish wars that could end up employing nuclear weapons and involving them. This could’ve happen when an ally was directly challenged and nuclear deterrence had to become immediate because of the crisis. The whole world could be placed in danger because of one false miscalculation in the sudden shifting in posturing, or the hasty action of one determined and unrelenting leader. So in a sense, once the bombs were there and it seemed a complicated situation to disarm either side, what seemed to make the most sense was to ensure nuclear weapons would lead to MAD. In this there was assurance that the thought of launching a first strike would be considered so diabolical and irrational that it would simply not be used. Therefore the utility of nuclear weapons could be seen in general deterrence rather than in immediate deterrence. That is nuclear weapons could be used for A to send a vague threat to B and B would be dissuaded.[10]
With MAD, deterrence could become compellence and the deterrer could become the deterred. When A devises deterrence policy, it has to also consider the real option that B has of resisting it as well as of imposing its own controls on the choices of A. In the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, the USA warned the USSR not to pass ships carrying more missiles in the American blockade and also to stop building missile bases in Cuba. The Soviet Union in turn, was still able to tell the Americans that should their threat be realised, there would be sure consequences. In this way the deterrence process has to be adaptable since A no longer has the advantage of creating a situation where B’s choices are denied, and that possibly any coercion can be met with counter coercion. It may mean as it did in the cold war a different way of bargaining and can even offer room for co-operation on another strands of the relationship, as was the case between the USSR and USA, when it came to nuclear arms control, even while deterring each other. This could be seen when the USA and USSR signed in 1972 the SALT I covering a number of areas including the limitation of ballistic missiles. [11] Bilateral actions such as this has, contributed to the vertical decrease in the absolute numbers of nuclear weapons to this day.
2. Nuclear Proliferation and Nuclear Deterrence
Is the Horizontal Spread of Nuclear Weapons Accompanied by Notions of Deterrence?
From the period since 1945 to 1991 or the end of the Cold War international politics can be described as having moved into a Second nuclear age. This is on the account of nuclear deterrence theory having to be re-conceptualised in a world marked by a different balance of power as well as new issues of security facing the nation state as well as international security. At the start of the 21st century the possibility of further horizontal nuclear proliferation has not been eliminated and the extent to which the doctrine and resulting policies of deterrence is accompanying this spread is likely to affect the view on deterrence. Most of the literature especially as exemplified by the rise in the discourse of rogue and weak states, suggests that deterrence remains contentious in discussions of contemporary international politics. One of the main reasons is the inability to give utility to nuclear weapons in the current multi-polar world. This is demonstrated in the uncertainty that the spread of nuclear weapons has been accompanied with the same ideas of their utility that maintained deterrence in the Cold War. Most of the states so far who want to acquire nuclear weapons have shown themselves to lack those particular qualities that led the USSR and the USA to arrive at a national deterrence strategy once realising the nature of the utility of nuclear weapons. When the NPT was opened for signatures in 1968, it only recognised China, Great Britain, France, USSR/Russia and the United States as the five legitimate nuclear powers. All other non nuclear states that signed did so with the agreement of refraining from acquiring nuclear weapons. [12]All of the World’s states are signatories with the exception of India , Israel, Pakistan and North Korea after pulling out in 2003.[13]
Deterrence Problematic in Multi-polar World.
Deterrence after the Cold War has continued to be problematic for at least these reasons. First the long peace written about the Cold War after it had ended was constituted by the assured danger of destruction, which created stability that relied on a situation of too great a balance of accumulated weapons that create danger and the likelihood of war. [14] The particular national cultures of the USSR and the USA allowed them to respond to MAD by adopting deterrence and deciding internally that they would never use nuclear weapons while bluffing to their opponent that they will certainly use them some if they had to. Secondly the bi-polarity created by the two, meant the focus was clear and policy can be directed relatively easily. In the Post Cold War world, the model of deterrence based on mirror imaging and deterrence through denial by rational actors is not so readily applicable. This is because the fall of the Soviet Union created a relatively more multi-polar balance which was compounded by the economic growth of more countries who are able to assert themselves if not necessarily to balance themselves against the United States but certainly to challenge its consolidated hegemony. Even as there have been a vertical decrease in the numbers of nuclear weapons by the super powers, there has been a horizontal spread of nuclear weapons. There is still concern in the international system that more states could acquire nuclear weapons.
North Korea and Iran Exemplify Case Studies of Continuing Concern over Horizontal Nuclear Proliferation.
The extent to which Chairman Kim Jong Il and president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are viewed as being likely to adopt deterrence will affect the utility with which it is viewed. Currently and since the Korean War for North Korea and the 1970s Iranian War for Iran represent to the international system, the ‘foremost nuclear proliferation issues.’ [15] North Korea and its leader has built a reputation of dissent that remains a worrying concern. It formally withdrew from the NPT, and has proved unreliable in its commitments to ongoing talks to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons. It has proved unresponsive to talks with the US, Russia, South Korea, Japan and most notably, even with China which has failed to appease it. Instead in October 2006[16] it carried out its first atomic test in defiance of the rest of the international community. In 2006 the a UN resolution banned North Korea from continuing further activity to do with its missile programme. In 2007 when the UN failed to apologise for the condemnation of its programme, it banned international inspectors and also pulled out of the six party talks involving the countries above. Most recently in 2009, North carried an underground test of nuclear bomb it claimed was as big as those dropped by the US on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and which were also felt in earth quake tremors in South Korea, as well as the China coast. Pyongyang has shown an independent streak with defiance for international regimes of co-operation. Iran is a topical concern because it has a workable bomb design but had not been produced yet. The concern is in the uncertainty of whether or not it wants to develop nuclear weapons. President Ahmadinejad has responded to claims of his intentions to have plutonium converted for nuclear bombs, by repeatedly retorting this and claiming, its for nuclear energy. CIA intelligence claim, that even if it does want to build a nuclear bomb, it is some fifteen years away to that capability.[17]
The USA developed the nuclear bomb as the ultimate weapon able to debilitate an enemy army to the point of total annihilation. For all the latter countries that became nuclear including the USSR itself, did so from the allure of the bomb as an equalising capability. Indeed the USA developed their bomb with the view of meeting the Soviet threat in conventional arms. For Both North Korea and Iran, the concern is that their behaviour in regards to the security regimes of the international system, have not revealed them to be the assuring candidates for maintaining a national strategy of deterrence. In some ways this is hypocritical if we were to talk about an international system characterised by multi-polarity and which can be described an international system of states. When the USA and the USSR developed their arsenals, deterrence came after, in the coming to terms with the implications of the nuclear weapon. They both intended to use them in war situations. And there were no overbearing forces challenging their rights to do so, as the modern USA and Russia as well as the rest of the international community represent against particular states with their eye on the ultimate weapon. They too want to assert their right ands choice as well as maintain national security. Representatives for the North Korean Foreign Ministry emphasise the usefulness of the latest bomb testing as a form of bargaining leverage. It could be understood from their literature that a main goal of Pyongyang is to establish direct dialogue with the USA. And certainly creating a situation of tension for the US could compel its administration to engage with North Korea. For Iran, an investment and the securing of nuclear weapons today can ensure to some extent a more inclined USA/ Western ear. There are prevailing ideas in Iran concerning its state craft as a modern Islamic republic, able to decide its own future without being restricted by the USA and the West. And without western culture marauding national culture. It could encompass a toleration for neighbours outside their borders with unlikely intentions of nuclear attacks for the sake of self-assertion , a lack of unnecessary dangerouse posturing or relentless wars of expansion.
In the second nuclear age we are able to talk about security being more than the geopolitical security of the state but also as security of the human. This view comes under broader definitions of security, or under the liberal peace thesis of the ‘responsibility to protect,’ which shot roots in the aftermath of the Cold war and which are discussed further in chapter four. Under these frameworks the security of the integrity of the state can be justified in its capacity to protect its citizens. If the international community has a responsibility to protect, then the question of national security is international. In this way security concerns of any one country is able to be assessed the international community, in terms of its effect in the wider family of human beings. Under this framework we can justify the concern that so far North Korea and Iran refuse to engage in calls from international regimes of peace. However, it can be said once more that these regimes prevailing regimes of peace could simply be a reflection of the prominent power and their peace. Nonetheless, their dissident behaviour as also marked by their domestic politics has led some commentators to describe them as presenting an aggressive and hot headed tendency, which is not compatible with the ideas of the rational actor, which underpins the working of nuclear deterrence.[18] And also which worked to prevent total war even in the absurdity of MAD. Furthermore, the second nuclear age exists in an international system where developing communication and transportation technology is able to transform the methods used by violent dissident groups, as exemplified though not unique to the 9/11 attacks in New York as wells the 7/7 London bombings, in most recent times. In being uncertain about the character of the statesmen as wells national strategy leading Iran and North Korea, this very much presents opportunity for thinking about worse case scenarios of nuclear weapons getting into the wrong hands which challenges the existence of deterrence in the 21st century and the utility of nuclear weapons.
4. Issues in Contemporary International Security and Deterrence in the Second Nuclear Age.
In the first decade of the 21st century state foreign policies continue to be challenged in arriving at policy efforts which recognises the contemporary nature of an interdependent global economy underlined by distinctly new developments in communication and information technologies even alongside effects of traditional transformations of labour movement from areas of high cost production to those of low cost production. States find themselves having to rethink their state sovereignty for securing economic prosperity seen in developments states gathering in regional or international economic organisations. Since its creation the European Union (EU) has seen two further enlargements, as well as increased powers as an organisation and further integration as body of individual states, as for example the opportunity for countries to join a common European Union (EU) currency which 12 countries have joined. In 2007, a Referendum was held in European Union countries to ratify an updated EU constitution. Over 80% of the members exchanged their sovereignty for more open trading markets and economic environments. The example of the EU is supplement to the continued existence and working of international economic organisations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World bank. A large number of developing countries continue to have their prerogatives for domestic policy challenged by these organisations in the form of conditional loans since the 1980s. In the second nuclear age they have not left. The relevance of sovereignty in discussing challenges to deterrence is seeing nuclear deterrence as a strategy conducted in an international society of states with equal judicial and de facto sovereignty. With similar capabilities, they can deter each other. The contemporary international relations, causes states to find alternative ways of securing a varieties of national interests, which cannot be reduced to ideological containment or defence and expansion.
In an international politics free to focus on more issues other than the super power nuclear stand- off, Climate change has been recognised as a major threat to international security. Today it grows in importance in policy analysis. The notion that burning fossil fuels are leading to increased global temperatures which could melt ice caps and lead to floods in some areas of the world and droughts in others, was initially driven by a normative purpose to secure the survival of human life in the preservation of the earth. The challenge against it , as it was in the beginning was its difficulty in being justified as a major priority since policies to prevent further climate change were and are still juxtaposed against policies for economic growth. In recent years however the impact of climate change on international security is being increasingly seen as significant even as there remains difficulty in reconciling it with economic policy. The aim of the Stern Review in 2006 was to calculate an economic cost of taking no action against climate change in the immediate term. The Kyoto Protocol plays a role in recognising climate change and so do world wide efforts accompanying it. However these efforts of states coming together to tackle a common evil, which renders nuclear deterrence counterproductive, is not universal. International politics still has decisive streaks of real-politick which are not overcome by these international threats. For example the US, before being over taken by China as the worlds biggest polluter in 2007, refused to join and apply the Kyoto Protocol. However more recent investigations show increased domestic efforts guided by international regimes are growing and expanding in domestic sectors to fight against climate change.
At least in the last five years, the theme of energy security with the notion that this has to be sustainable has become more pronounced. Arguably the debate on climate change has been sustained also because of the realisation that the resources countries use today ( coal, oil, gas ), to run the technologies that sustain the modern society will not be provided by the earth indefinitely. In this initial stage there has been international pressure for training the continued development of the world economy to grow in a sustainable manner. This has been accompanied and will likely gain momentum as the years go by, for pressures to find alternative sustainable energy sources. The British Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) since 2007 has been developing an Alternative energy and Sustainability programme[33] to research how the British Ministry of Defence (MoD) can decrease vulnerability to capability by becoming less reliant on scarce energy resources. It aims in the short run to reduce the level of energy the whole army and its support requires, in the medium run securing alternative fuels, and in the long run to secure alternative energy sources and therefore also changing technologies, equipment and practices appropriately. Alternatives are combined heat and power plants, solar and hydrogen cells, heat pumps and wind power , synthetic, hybrid or bio fuels, are being considered in 2009. The hope for alternative energy seems to lie in a technological fix of capturing Carbon Dioxide from the air or renewable energy. There may be a perceived need for international efforts to move this process along to facilitate more efficient use of scarce energy or methods of power generation and technology that captures CO2. This is likely to be seen along with domestic analysis such as that of the MoD, spread in most sector of society across many states in the near future. Energy security remains a profound challenge to the existence of states if states exist as a means to protect human beings. It threatens modern lives as we know it today. This then displaces nuclear deterrence as a central priority in national security at the start of the 21st century. However, these efforts are just as likely to encourage much more uncooperative foreign policies of national security where each state senses a growing insecurity and a growing untrustworthiness for other states. Instead each wants to secure scare energy for itself. There maybe more efforts aimed at being less vulnerable to lack of energy, relative to other states and move to more unilateral efforts for national interests.
Nonetheless a sense of an international community is likely to be reconstituted as there remains a notion of having to co-ordinate internationally to find energy that is sustainable not only in being available indefinitely but also in a way that isn’t risky to the earth and therefore to human life. The consequences of detrimental usage of natural resources are understood as being capable of affecting every country. So security even if narrowed down to state security is challenged by a threat that requires co-operative methods which is contrary to the oppositional politics that allowed deterrence to thrive. This first decade on the new millennium also sees a continuation of efforts against terrorism after 9/11. This international co-operation has called for states to find ground for mutual benefits even in ideologically differing states such as Pakistan and USA, to interact for a certain outcome.
There remains a myriad of policy areas demanding of states an international relations whether in more mutually beneficial co-operation or ones much more underlined by relative power relations, to tackle international threats such as global warming and energy security or countering terrorism. They require an international relations and politics that is much more sensitive and multifaceted. This is whether in the kind of relationship formed by states with other states but also in the way they have to incorporate policies to support non state actors such as multinational companies for some countries a, or defending domestic policies against non-state actors such as multinational companies for some. It is an international politics that doesn’t easily incorporate the notion of an indefinite end of states acquiring nuclear weapons and then deciding to use it in deterrence against regional or distant enemies.
Conclusion
Nuclear deterrence was out of favour at least since the end of the Cold War mainly because in order to work it was supported by both the USSR and the Soviet Union acquiring nuclear arms more than the other. It was a reversal of logic that the maintenance of uncertainty created by one country against the other should secure inaction and peace. The two superpowers held the whole world at risk. Nuclear deterrence was also criticised because it worked on the assumption that all actors involved are rational actors, so that their behaviour could be rationalised and appropriate policy arrived at. The calculations for this exclude and ignore the other options available for the state being deterred or the state being compelled in return. Those are for example the chance that the deterred or target of deterrence could have alternative perceptions and so may misread signals, also that each might have a different view of what constitutes rational behaviour. This could be seen in the way different national strategic culture can affect nuclear policy.
Nuclear proliferation remains dangerous not least because of the continued threat of international terrorism but also of unstable states. Military preventative action has been the main response to national nuclear deterrence where for example preventative action against Iran and North Korea might be considered. There are calls for a much more democratic transformation of deterrence into a broader umbrella and one which emphasises the common interest of survival along with other contemporary threats to the international system seen in this light such as global warming.
The fact remains however states have to live in world where other some nuclear weapons exist and some states do have them. In the second nuclear age, this fact competes against other emerging contemporary issues impacting the foreign polices of states, such as climate change, energy security human security and economic security in way in didn’t have to during the cold war. The total number of nuclear arms has been decreasing since the height of the Cold War, on the account of Both Russia and the USA decreasing their absolute vertical numbers. However horizontally the have spread, often with the countries who acquired them expressing the same views of wanting to secure national borders from stronger enemies. Nonetheless most states in the world it would seem do not mind falling under the nuclear umbrella of the initial nuclear powers. What is strikingly different in the Second nuclear age is the rising number of threats confronting states attention, policy time and effort as well as funds which are likely to win over nuclear weapons for non nuclear sates. For nuclear states it seems a safer bet to remain maintaining ones own while the enemy is still capable of using theirs even if this is to a much less degree than in the cold war. Certainly central place of nuclear deterrence is being continually challenged.
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In the earliest part of the cold war the United States enjoyed a clearly superior nuclear force to the Soviet Union but eventually nuclear parity was achieved and a new phase of the cold war had started. Realizing their vulnerability each side began producing nuclear weapons at a furious rate in an attempt to stay ahead of the other. The United States adopted a policy called Mutual Assured Destruction, a.k.a. MAD where protection for the population was achieved by ensuring the capability to utterly destroy the attacker if attacked. (Wilde)…
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The nuclear arms race was a competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War. During the Cold War, in addition to the American and Soviet nuclear stockpiles, other countries developed nuclear weapons, though none engaged in warhead production on nearly the same scale as the two superpowers.…
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A fundamental component of the proliferation debate revolves around the perceived or alleged efficiency of nuclear deterrence. Proliferation optimists argue that, “more may be better” because nuclear weapons increase the cost of nuclear conflict, ultimately deterring states from engaging in nuclear warfare with a nuclear-armed state (Suzuki 2015). Optimists argue that nuclear deterrence works reliably, thus there seemingly less to be feared from nuclear proliferation and beneficial to a state to…
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The Cold War , it was an open yet restricted rivalry that developed after World War II between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies. The Cold War was waged on political, economic, and propaganda fronts and had only limited recourse to weapons. The term was used by an American financier and presidential adviser Bernard Baruch during a congressional debate in 1947.…
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The title itself, “Atomic Bomb and the Origins of the Cold War,” simply depicts the true cause of this international standstill. Although the writers introduce the audience to the underlying background behind this war, such as increasing political tension between a soon-to-be-called Anglo-American alliance and the U.S.S.R during and previous to World War II, the main focus of this composition is exemplified by the impact which the atomic bomb had on establishing an international control or world order. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt hoped to implement this international world order, founded on principles that would uphold the idea of international atomic control and safety.…
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Containment was the foreign policy put forth by the United States to challenge Russia during the Cold War (Kennan and Containment, n.d.).…
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Global Policy Forum, "This marks the death of Deterrence (October 9, 2002)." Preemption. 10 September 2005.…
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On the other hand, one could produce an equally valid argument against the use of nuclear deterrence. While nuclear deterrence helps with reducing the chance of nuclear war, it is by no means a guaranteed barrier. It is easily seen that nuclear weapons hold the potential for the loss of innocent life; around 150,000 were lost in the U.S. attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In addition to the loss of life, the loss of large sums of government money is a second argument against nuclear deterrence. It is estimated that between 1940 and 2000, $5.5 trillion were spent on nuclear weapons programs, and nearly $350 billion is estimated to be spent in the next ten years. It can easily be argued this money would be better spent on government projects…
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In the Article “Redefining Security”, Richard H. Ullman argues that it would be much more beneficial in the long run, if governments were to put more focus on non-military issues, rather than military issues. He states that defining national security merely (or even primarily) in military terms conveys a profoundly false image of reality (Ullman 1983, 129). Ullman states that, a significant disadvantage when a government’s main focus is on the military threats and they disregard non-military threats is that the total security of a nation gets reduced (Ullman 1983, 129). He argues in his article that non-military threats should be given greater attention. Ullman also goes on to state that when a nation only focuses on making their military strong, this act causes pervasive militarization, which eventually causes global insecurity between nations (Ullman 1983, 129).…
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Our experience in the war on terror (WOT) reinforces the fact that protecting the Nation and its global interests requires more than passive defensive measures. The threats posed by terrorist groups and rogue states, especially those that gain access to WMD, mandate a swift offense.…
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A law in relation to defence requires a test of proportionality, so that law-making channels are seen as being able to be “reasonably appropriate and adapted to the purpose of defence”[4]. Thus, in attempting to determine the correct application of the defence power in the current political climate, one must contemplate all facts and circumstances surrounding the threat of terrorism before coming to a conclusion. One must also look back through the history of the defence power to decipher the correct proportional means by which it is applied.…
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References: Keel, R. (2004, August 23), Rational Choice and Deterrence Theory. Retrieved September 16, 2004, from http://www.umsl.edu/~rkeel/200/ratchoc.html…
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